The Essence of Life

Sunday, December 30, 2012

My Friend Sandor Hauser

One of Mr. Hauser's many creations

I first met Sandor
Hauser around 1992 or at the latest 1993 at that time ACTA (Associação
Campineira de Tiro ao Alvo) on a Saturday afternoon when I was trying to get
started into shooting, not an easy undertaking for someone with very little
money in Brazil, where everything connected with guns and shooting is brutally
regulated and expensive.

Through a
number of deals I became the owner of a Caramuru 32 S&W Long revolver, a
virtual copy of a Smith & Wesson Hand Ejector of outstanding quality. I had
but a handful of shells and store bought ammunition was out of my reach, so
after I fired no more than a cylinder full I had to put it away and just hang
around at the ACTA “back shooting aisle” where all the informal shooters
congregated to look at guns and people using them.

Then this
older gentleman approached me and asked me why I was not shooting, and I
explained my situation. He told me to go ahead and shoot and give him my empty
shells and that he would reload them for me. He gave me his address and said
that I could come Monday evening to his home if I wanted to learn how to reload
ammunition.

Let’s say that
that was the beginning of a beautiful friendship!

What I found
was a paradise for an engineer-to-be and gun lover. On the back of his home Mr.
Hauser had a “bunker” by his own definition, and besides all the machinery, reloading
equipment, ammunition and guns I found a heart of pure gold, endless patience
and a willingness to share his knowledge, time and personal history that is extremely
rare.

Rather than
reload my ammo, Mr. Hauser made me take sit by the press, and guided me through
each careful step. When we finished he told me to come to the club again next Saturday
and shoot with him, and I told him that although his price for ammo was much
less than at the local gun shops, it was still expensive and I could not shoot
every weekend. Again his kindness came to play and he told me that rather than
charge me for the ammo, he would sell me the components in quantities that I
could afford (100 cast lead bullets, 100 primers and an amount of smokeless
powder to suit, plus some extra shells so I could have at least one full box of
32’s).

I remember
coming home with a small bundle that contained all my ammunition and supplies
like it was a treasure, and thinking back twenty years, it was.

Sometime later,
Mr. Hauser decided to build some reloading presses, one of which is shown
above. The process was heavily labor intense, and I eagerly awaited the final product.
The price was one hundred and twenty US dollars, and I paid him in six monthly
installments. This is arguably the best single stage press I ever used.

My son was
born on January 31st 1995 and I graduated a couple weeks after that.
Mr. Hauser and his wife, Mrs. Therezinha, were the first couple to come visit,
and we drank the “baby’s pee”, in this particular case part of the content of a
bottle of Ballantine’s Gold Seal.

Another piece
of equipment that Mr. Hauser designed and built was a shell tumbler and washer.
Mine was made using a plastic milk jug and powered by a discarded IBM
typewriter and a baby cart wheel.

When we “graduated”
from handgun to high power rifle we both had 7x57 mm rifles, and ammunition was
even harder to come by. I don’t know exactly how, but Mr. Hauser was able to
acquire a large quantity of World War II vintage Brazilian Army ammo, made at Fábrica
do Realengo and market 1942. The small problem was that most, if not all
primers, were dead due to poor storage.

But that was
no problem at all to Mr. Hauser. He patiently disassembled each of the 4,000
plus cartridges, put the beautiful 173 grain spitzer bullets aside, collected
every grain of powder for future reuse, and then started the even more labor
intense process of reconditioning each shell.

The problem
was that the old military ammo used corrosive Berdan large rifle primers, so
each shell had to be inspected and grade good or not, then as Berdan primers
are slightly larger than the boxer primers we would use to reload, he developed
a die and tool to reform and close the primer pocket to the proper dimension.
After the operation each shell would be good to three or four reloads if we
used lower pressure lead bullets, or two or three if would use the military
specification.

There were
many other projects. The least successful one was our attempt to use three 7 mm
bullets as a “flechette” for 12 gun shotguns. We never could hit anything with
it. The more successful ones were to convert available cartridges to
unavailable one. Cutting down 38 Special and 32 S&W Long to 38 S&W and
32 S&W was easy and straightforward. Much more complex was reforming 38
Super cases to fit Dr. Nivaldo’s 30 Luger pistol.

At one time when
there was no or very limited choice of jacketed pistol bullets, Mr. Hauser made
a lot of .357 jacketed hollow points using old TV antenna aluminum tubes.

Another of his
pet projects was to recondition once fired bullets that were recovered from the
club dirt trap. He would wash and sort them and then swage and calibrate each
one. The reconditioned 9 mm 115 grains made great reloads for my 2 inch 38 snubby
revolver due to the very low recoil.

I couldn’t ever
repay what Mr. Hauser has done for me. My feeble attempt is to try to bring new
people to shooting and hunting. If a new shooter shows up at the club (and I
mostly shoot shotguns nowadays), I will always volunteer a gun and box of
shells so this person can cut his or her teeth at a couple clay birds.

Even leaving
outside of Brazil for over 13 years I visited Mr. Hauser at least annually, but
about two years ago, due to age and health issues, Mr. Hauser and Mrs. Therezinha
moved in with their only daughter, and since that time I was unable to contact
him. I am still trying.

1 comment:

Once time Mr. Hauser came into my shop with a big bag of empty cartridges brass and asked me to make a model O with they. I asked to melt the cartridges and make the body of the press , after that I finished. Mr Hauser stayed very proud with the press. He always came to visit me,he was a very sympathetic person.Eloir from Brazil

About Me

Rodrigo Tardelli Meirelles was born in Brazil, in 1969, and raised on the family farm, Fazenda Taboa, in close contact with the outdoors. By his own definition a dreamer and an explorer, Rodrigo was launched at a young age into a journey in search of knowledge that took him across countries and continents, and the world became the fertile ground where the stories in this book were planted and are now being harvested. True to the pioneer spirit Rodrigo set himself to explore the world, working and raising a family while maintaining his dreams alive and pursuing his passion for hunting and shooting wherever he goes. He currently lives in Traverse City, Michigan, with his wife Maria José, children Maria Eduarda and Daniel and their black lab Tupã.